This could have easily been called Form vs. Substance. For all you that don’t know it, I LOVE music. All kinds, from Incubus to Nas to Carlos Santana. I love hip hop the most. The good stuff. Nas is one of the greatest emcees of all time. He’s unique. He never cares about what people think of him. He doesn’t care what is popular. He makes songs that he likes. He does this all with little regard to the monetary reward of going along with the crowd. (Much to the hurtin’ of his wallet sometimes.) His WIFE Kelis is just as much of a vanguard. She’s famous for her girlpower attitude and the song “I hate you so much right now.” She never fell into being the cliché of the R&b Itch. She dresses different. She even cut off all her “good” hair to have a short, sassy do (a SIN worse than murder in the white-supremacy obsessed Black community---just check out the ten pounds of weave on every Black woman’s head in the music industry and the woman below who wants you to believe its her real hair). She stays sexy, but remains the classic Strong, Black Woman. She doesn’t come off as a victim or the background armcandy of her man. She laughes out loud and she’s intelligent. I know she must read, because Nas does. Then we have our opponents to this lifestyle. Jay Z has turned into the most commercially successful rappers of all time because he sold his soul for riches. He changed his rap style to fit the Dr. Seuss simplicity that sells records. He choose topics to rap about what the main consumers of rap (white males) likes to hear, i.e., nothing thought provoking or pro-Black or educational. To white males rap is the rebellion music that shocks their parents, to be abandoned when its time to grow up (of course, black males never seem to pick up the part about growing up because they believe it there culture to be ignorant and money obssessed) Jay Z glorifies moneylust, consumerism, and materialism. He constantly talks about things, not ideas. He lives for what is popular and hip, but never seems to be original or stand alone as his own man. His GIRLFRIEND, Beyonce is more of the same. She constantly talks about shoes, purses and designer clothes. She uses her body like lascivious stripper or porn star. She even has to come up with an alternate ‘personality’ so she can perform her sex-crazed gyrations to semi-good beats. She was asked by Oprah a few years ago: what’s your favorite book? There was a ten second moment of silence. She didn’t have one. She doesn’t READ. She’s not even quick witted enough to say something lame like the Bible. She is the American Iconic woman turned on its head: a dumb, fake Blonde who’s Black. She’s sex-symbol, but she has no ownership of herself. She’s a puppet. She has no voice. She doesn’t say girlpower in the least. Her sole purpose seems to be to please men with little regard to her own pleasure. Ugh.
Doesn’t anyone understand where I’m going with this??? Probably not. I live on a island.
It is through creating, not possessing, that life is revealed.
Vida D. Scudder
6 comments:
You're sounding more like John McWorther, Thomas Sowell, and Bill Cosby.
If you're not liberal when you're young, you have no heart. If you're not conservative when you're old, you have no brain.
Winston Churchill
um your thoughts are not that different from other people's. do not indulge yourself in such delight.
To Anonymous #1: You didn't know Felicia has a "Barack for President" t-shirt did you?
To Anonymous #2: you're just too cool for bloggers' so-called original thoughts...then why you reading it!
Furthermore, I hate anonymous people, what, you skurred to put your real/screen name or something?!
Felicia, you have some meanspirited commenters! Shake them hatas off, girl!
Why does it matter? I will never understand why women (especially) overly criticise female entertainers like Beyonce for not being "black" enough for them. Is it not possible to just let them be who they are trying to be? I could care less that Beyonce has 10lbs of fake hair on her head, if she has a good song with a good beat I'll listen to it. You seem to criticise her especially in your blog, and from reading your blog before, I guess I expected a little less catty and more acceptance of differences (especially when it comes to how someone chooses to dress and do their hair, I mean come on....).
That’s what public/celebrities are there for. They are to be critiqued as much as they are admired. I’m not that much of a fan of Beyonce’ myself. Interestingly enough, I heard on talk radio that she and her mother are going to be part of a study about mothers and daughters and positive images! That will be an interesting case study.
However, I don’t know Beyonce’ or her mother personally. I’m not a star glazed fanatic. My knowledge is from what I hear. It is true or simply rumor that she used methods to make herself seem lighter and that they intentionally had her back up singers in Destiny’s Child tan to be darker? Once again, this is just what I heard, it maybe completely fictional.
However, I can say this with confidence. Beyonce’ in my opinion is overrated. Our generation doesn’t understand real music and quality showmanship. The 70’s was a height of black musicianship. The eighties continued much of that. Then in the 90’s the focus shifted completely away from quality and sound and towards image. Now I’m not saying that music from the previous decades was perfect. However in the previous decades you still had performers who actually knew how to play an instrument. You had performer who didn’t need 50pieces of electronics to sound palatable.
Yes I critique Beyonce and her associate’s. I critique them because while they are performers they are also Africans! The unfair reality is that minorities are often times judged by the actions and behaviors of the few. With few representations of Africans in the media there is much at stake. Music is powerful. Music has the power to touch a person’s innermost soul and stir that which one didn’t know they had.
The problem is that the public doesn’t demand a return on its investment. We put Beyonce there. We put the rest there. We buy the records, we support the stations and channels that play the records and then we sit a wonder why all that is…is.
Why the criticism. There would possibly be less criticism if there were a more balanced representation of Africans in the media. However when all the attention is directed to Beyonce and her ilk! Then someone has to speak out.
Anonymous, you state that you are only concerned with the performance. That’s your right. However for me that would be too simplistic. I can’t support a system simply based on price or what have you. Because there are deeper, issues at play. I have niece and I want her to see respected, powerful independent women. Beyonce is fine but she shouldn’t be the epitome of Black womanhood…at least that how I feel.
For your long blog entry, all you ended up doing was hating. You didnt give credit where credit is due. Nas yes is a good MC, Kelis is ok she had to good songs "I hate you so much right now" and the infamous "bossy" both of which i was rocking until they faded out, at the sametime jay-z is also an incredible MC, personally one of the best, now beyonce on the other hand is on her way, if she hasnt already, to becoming one of the best entertainers in the industry, she stays true to her roots of being born in houston and from louisiana. Now she may wear weave but how many black women out there dont wear weave in one point in their life? And for those who dont they need to, but dont hate on the fact that she is a beautiful talented girl who just capitalizes on her available resources. Now anyone who can honestly sit and say beyonce isnt an incredible singer or performer is just deaf to their ear and need not to listen to music ever again. For those of you who say seh doesnt empower women because she talks about money clothes cars, etc. then you must not pay attention to words of the song and just listen the hook. For the entire time she is letting men know that with or without a man a woman can conquer all, and allowing women to understand that it is ok for them to step into the drivers seat.
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